When I first reported Henry Waxman’s comments that the House and Senate would conference informally on the health care bill and then pass amendments back and forth between chambers rather than have a formal conference, I really didn’t consider it a big deal. It wasn’t even the main part of my story. But many other news organizations picked up on it, calling it a “freeze-out” of Congressional Republicans.

I really don’t understand the logic here. A formal conference committee doesn’t really give the kind of input to the minority party that the AP imputes above. When Republicans controlled Congress, they routinely used the conference committee to strip out anything laudable from bills that was passed through the various chambers. Here’s just one example from former Senator Jim Jeffords:

“As we began 2001, I was hopeful. With a 50-50 U.S. Senate, I expected that moderates would be a strong force and that bipartisanship would prevail. At first, this seemed true. Moderate senators from both parties worked together to make significant changes to the president’s budget when it was considered in early April. We were able to reduce the size of the tax cut from $1.6 trillion to $1.25 trillion and to add $450 billion for education. But when we sent that bill to the House-Senate conference committee, all our work, including the $450 billion for education, was stripped out of the final compromise. There were no moderates on the conference committee; it was totally controlled by the Republican leadership and the White House. More than simply disappointing, the events were a clear signal to me that the Republican leadership had no intention of working with the moderate wing of the party. Something radical needed to happen.”

Democrats are foregoing a conference committee for two reasons – to quicken the process on the front end (Republicans would have been able to delay the management of a formal conference committee for a few weeks) and to allow for flexibility between the proposals between the House and Senate, with the possibility of adding new compromise items. I have problems with Congress basically bypassing its own ethics reform law so new provisions can be air-dropped into a reconciled bill, and that’s why larger bills pretty much have opted for ping-ponging instead of conference committees. But that’s not really to cut Republicans out of the deal. They’ve made every intention known that they’re not voting for the bill anyway, and they would be outvoted in a conference committee regardless. That to me is just whining.

I think C-SPAN’s request to televise negotiations between the House and Senate on the health care bill is laudable, but let’s be honest, it’s probably not going to happen. Many progressives are concerned that a back-room negotiation will cut them out of any dealmaking. The proper answer to that is for them to make it publicly known that they won’t vote for a bill without certain items. With such a narrow margin for error, this would have the effect of opening up the negotiations and forcing them to be carried out in public. So it’s not like progressives in Congress don’t have options.

They’d certainly have plenty of backup. Health Care for America Now, the lead coalition of reform advocates, is clearly standing behind the House bill and even running ads along those lines. Any Democrat in the House or Senate could run with these proposals and demand their inclusion or else their vote is not assured. The response would be a one-way ticket to the negotiating table.

1. MAKE GOOD HEALTH CARE AFFORDABLE
Low and middle income families must be able to afford health insurance, and employers must be asked to provide good health coverage for their employees so health care is affordable at work. Health care should not be paid for with a tax on health benefits.

2. HOLD INSURANCE COMPANIES ACCOUNTABLE
If the insurance companies win, we lose. Insurance companies must be held accountable with strong regulations and consumer protections, and we must be given the choice of a national public health insurance option available on day one across the United States.

Those aren’t the only areas, there are quite literally dozens of major discrepancies between the House and Senate bills, and on most counts the House’s is superior. I encourage you to read this report from the House Tri-Committee detailing all the differences, including some things I had previously missed. Just as an example, the Senate bill grandfathers in all employer plans offering their existing level of coverage, even if it falls well below the minimum benefit guarantee. The House bill gives employers five years to improve their coverage, and that’s it.

The fact that leadership put out this document suggests they know well what needs defending in the House bill, and while they’re unlikely to get all of it, there will certainly be a negotiation.

So there will be negotiations aimed at reconciling the two bills, beginning today with a leadership meeting. And because of the nature of the party-line vote, virtually everyone who voted for the bill previously will have a chance to shape that negotiation. It’s all a matter of what they’re willing to do to get what they want.

David-David-David….
Progressives have the same opportunity now to make this bill more progressive that they have had for the last six months. Zero. The problem is that the Democratic Party is not progressive and the so-called progressives in Congress are just that, “so-called”. This is corruption and bribery not a political process of any kind. The so-called progressives try to keep the left-wing of the Party from defecting without upsetting the applecart – that is the applecart full of campaign donations from the insurance and drug industries. The “congressional progressives” don’t want to win, that’s not their role in the game.

Got an email from Schumer on HCR this afternoon. This is how the Ds are spinning it:

I strongly support the creation of new “Exchanges” through health care reform, in which insurance companies could sell affordable health insurance to individuals and small businesses. In these Exchanges, a not-for-profit health insurance company, which would compete on a level playing field with existing private health insurance plans, would help to lower premiums and exert downward pressure on the premiums of existing insurance plans.

Seems to me like the Progressives have already conceded.Mandated lousy health care. With medicare cuts. What is not to love about it if you are an insurance company? The rahm administration is just as ruthless as bush.

With the “ping pong” non-conference, 60 votes won’t be required in the Senate, yes? If they do this, it could conceivably negate the power of the Faux Dems there like Lieberman and Baucus et al. Not only are you right, I think the potential to have a completely acceptable, if not really so hot, bill is there. They could drop the mandates, add the P.O., Expand Medicare to age 55… all kinds of dastardly “socialist” elements.

OK, I’m probably wrong. Ya’all could straighten me out. But I like this take on the matter, because you don’t give the non-conferencing partisans a pass on responsibility. They can do more… no excuses.

I think it always goes back to whom from each chamber is involved in the negotiations. If the Senate comes in with Baucus, Conrad etal and the House brings folks like Steny Hoyer and Mike Ross, we can kiss anything progressive good-bye.

This “reform” will create a new paradigm of government and corporations sharing the same interests, screwing the working and middle class. It’s Clinton/Obama’s 3rd Way, and “progressives” will be prevented from adding anything of substance to this abomination.

As the Parker Griffith staff exodus illustrates; the fact that P.G. was wrong and too far right on issues did not make for a good enough reason for his staff to exit en masse. Only when the party identity under whose auspices corporatist issues were being peddled as ‘responsive to the Democrat electorate’ was changed from ‘D’ to ‘R’, did those issues willy nilly become offensive to true blue Democrats?!?

When the populist, anti crony government revolution arrives, the centrist fuckers will take full charge, because progressives have no fucking ideas and are totally unprepared for what’s coming. Pathetic!

“any great triumph in the headlines for the hostage takers will likely come with some face-saving price extracted for the heartburn of rolling over.” ; THERE WILL BE NO ‘FACE SAVING’ ON THIS ISSUE!!

The public was screwed from day one when single payer was taken ‘off the table’; there is no ‘face’ to save, only their lack of courage and determination.

“But though we’ve made what I like to think of as great strides in our abilities to understand and influence the earlier stages of the legislative process, the latter stages still belong to the closed world of Members, staffers and lobbyists. Our infrastructure hasn’t developed to the point where we’re able to put policy and procedural experts in the room (or at least on the phones) with the staffers handling the last minute changes and rewrites.” ; wait a second.
This is an argument for a continuation of ‘the way things are’ and I am sick and tired of the ‘way things are’.

Especially since I KNOW that ‘things’ are only existent inasmuch as people are willing to have them be such.

“The expertise and the personnel needed to give the netroots a better shot at understanding and competing in that part of the process now mostly closed to them (but yet the playground of lobbyists) do exist.” ; yet again another argument for accepting the ‘way things are’. NO, lets change the ‘way things are’ so politicians aren’t beholden to monied interests and ,therefore, ‘lobbyists’ lose their ‘clout’.

Didn’t y’all vote for ‘change’? Are you so willing to give that idea up just because the person you thought would bring change isn’t doing that?

Progs have had that ‘every opportunity’ from day one, and have had little to show for it, much less GAIN from it.

Regardless of the formal, or informal conferencing at hand now, history shows FEW bills if any have ever been improved for progs or the masses at this stage of the legislative effort.

There will be mandates, there will be NO competition for private insurers, there will likely be NO elimination on caps (meaning the consumer has only SO much to draw from, then they are cut off), and Eshoo and Stupak in some form will serve PhARMA and the pro life crowd, while ensuring more people will die due to ‘evergreening’ and a lack of affordable generics along with women who lose their rights to choose who will likely die as they seek abortion alternatives that are not covered in their insurance.

My impression regarding this informal conference process is that it is mainly geared to prevent Republican stalling, and get the foul deed done ASAP, so Obama can sign it in time for the State Of The Union Address. I see NO hope of any improvements to the foul legislation from the Senate that will trump all and ensure a full giveaway to private insurance and PhARMA.

I see NO reason for any positive hope for changes to the Senate legislation that will benefit the masses, not even in the items you mention in your post above that MIGHT be put up for negotiation . . . . this is a lose/lose prospect at this point, barring the miracle of the pony that never was in The House.

The progs either HAVE no real power, or have failed and continue to fail to use that which they have. Either way, they sold us out, when they could have blocked this shit at any number of places, by being verbal and demanding ‘camera time’ for their position(s). But they couldn’t or wouldn’t hold together and get it done.

Sad, ain’t it.

I sure admire you seeking some hope in the despair I see . . . as always, thanks for all you and the others do, we’d all be MUCH less informed and dumbed down if it were not for your work(s).

As long as we fail to recognize that the Government is the ‘Typhoid Mary’ of our times, and start organizing the extraction of the offending entity, – we might as well be petitioning the Gov. to; fuck us harder, and to please don’t stop!

Point of pride: we’re not Obamabots!
Truth be told though, we’re equally effective!

I don’t see that going away, at all, it and the Eshoo ‘evergreening’ (which WILL be incorporated, just watch) and the elim of abortion funding are all etched in stone. They are features, not items for negotiation.

Any Senate Bill language WRT those issues is so full of swiss cheese holes that it’s laughingly insane to think the masses will really benefit in any way, shape or form from the so called ‘reforms’ . . .

The ball is similar to baseball, hard. Fielders do not wear protective equipment, with the exception of the wicket keeper. A slip (close infilder) stands about 3-5 years from the batter, and is epected to catch the ball if possible. Deep field catch a “fly ball” in their bare hands.

…All so we can care for the millions out there who drink their livers into mush, smoke their lungs into dead balloons, chow Big Macs, ride helmet-less, drive seatbelt-less, and go out friday nites just to get into a good bloody fight, yup lets be sure they get low insurance rates with no pre-existings so they can carry right on tomorrow, without worrying about their health care cost…the rest of us’ll just keep on feeling righteous, eating salad, and buckling-up…

This is excellent. I think this falls on the progressives. The GOP has continued to vote against everything for no rational reason. The “progressives” should vote against that does not contain a strong PO and employer mandates. We need real cost control.

insurance is a bigass scam. Did you know your credit rating affects your car insurance rates? Why? So, in the end, it won’t matter if someone is 150 pounds overweight. It probably won’t make much difference on their already inflated premiums. But if they missed a payment on their tv, then their rates will inflate.

If you live in Mass. there is a way to send a message to congress and Obama about this in Jan. during the special election for Ted Kennedy’s seat. The current democratic candidate, Martha Coakley, is supporting this bill. I can’t bring myself to vote for a Republican, but I plan on sitting the election out. If a republican even comes close to taking Kennedy’s seat it would send a message.

…its a basic ponzi scheme. health insurance requires the young and fit, who do not need it, to pay in fast enough, and long enough, to cover the costs of the unhealthy. in the end, few get their money back. some may break even. most of the money goes to the (relatively) few with catastrophic illnesses.

I agree, its just a friggin phony horse and poney show is all. In the end the final bill will be even further to the right then the present Senate bill. Thats what Obama and Rahm want. Whatever they sign will be sold to the public as historic so they don’t care as long as they put a smile on their Corp. backers. if somewhere down the line the rubes ( voters) figure out they’ve been had , so what chances are they’ll be gone anyway.

Well, Java, if you don’t have insurance and you need it, your up shit creek. I pay 930 dollars monthly for a high deductible BC/BS plan for myself and three children; when my daughter had an appendectomy two years ago, the total bill without insurance would have been over $25,000. With younger children, when my wife was killed five years ago, without her insurance, paying for daycare and someone to replace her doing my billing, our boat would have sunk.

It’s not that I don’t think insurance companies make obscene profits, they do, and I know that because I worked in managed mental health care for five years, but you can’t do without it if possible. Of course that is why the public option is so important. But this is politics, and we have to deal with that reality rather than bemoaning our fate and wringing our hands, as is seems to me so many posting here are want to do.

If the idea of ping-ponging avoids the filibuster 60, then it’s good. Are they concerned about a possible change in the party of the senator from Massachussetts?

If we only have to satisfy 50 senators on this final effort, then we can push the bill a little to the Left. I can’t say I’ve seen this kind of thing before, so I don’t quite know what’s possible or how long it’s likely to take.